Communication / Consulting / Process Improvement / Project Management / Requirements / Requirements management software / Requirements Models / Use Cases

Communicating a delivery schedule with use cases

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Use cases are a great tool for establishing the scope of a project. They provide a framework for defining what needs to be implemented (if it doesn’t support a use case, we don’t need to implement it). They also set expectations with stakeholders (here’s what you can do with the […]

Communication / Consulting / Requirements

Stay away from my users!

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We’ve dealt with user representatives who believed that they knew better than the users. We’ve dealt with people afraid to let consultants talk to the users, because the consultants might mis-set expectations and create bad will when the development team fails to deliver. We’ve dealt with over-protective information-hogs, who don’t want to telegraph their moves, for risk that they might lose control of the project, or lose credit for the project to someone else. How do we get past these barriers?

Communication / Requirements / Writing

Secret decoder ring

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I’m having a little trouble reading the spec – I left my secret decoder ring at home! Ever hear that before? A set of requirements that makes perfect sense to one team member can be completely unintelligible to others. Requirements written in business-speak, or full of accounting jargon may be […]

Communication / Requirements

Everything I Needed To Know I Forgot in Kindergarden

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“WHY?” is the central theme, the underlying cause, and the most important element to developing a successful product. And it plays an important role in documenting requirements. Without knowing why a product is valuable or why people will use it, or why it needs to be done in 3 months instead of 6, you aren’t likely to make the right decisions about what to include, when to include it, or how to market it.